I've been a fan since I was a little kid, playing the fantranslation of Tales of Phantasia's Super Nintendo version. The game has definitely aged badly, but I still love playing it - more than the GBA version which fucked up names and I have the Full Voice PSP version, although I haven't played in a while.

Afterwards I played Symphonia and it was my favorite Tales Of for a long time. I loved it. Yes the story was incredibly cliche, you could predict every single plot twist that was going to happen and even the characters are pretty cliche, but I still loved it. The dungeons, although some of the puzzles made me rage - fortunately I now remember all of them, despite not having played in months or years, and Kratos' line at the end made me cry.Downside is, by now I have gotten to dislike some of the characters. I never liked Collet that much, her English voice made be DESPISE HER AND WANT TO BURN HER but I calmed down a little when I heard the Japanese Collet. At least Mizuki Nana made Collet sound cute. But as the years have gone on, I have relaxed about Collet, although I think she and Lloyd are giant hypocrites.

Spoiler: Spoilers for Collet and Lloyd I guess

Lloyd says everyone has a right to live, but slaughters people left and right, regardless of whether they are human or half-elves. And Collet thinks it's baaaaad if someone sacrifices themselves for the great good, but if SHE wants to sacrifice herself, it's totally okay.

The message being racism was sort of meh... Refill's line about how getting rid of racism could take years or decades is pretty silly. You can't get rid of racism. The only thing you can manage to do is for people to fucking keep their mouths shut about their racist views.

When I decided to play Tales of the Abyss later on, I did it because I heard people constantly say how awesome it is and wanted to see for myself. I played it and loved it. The story was kind of convoluted and shoved the word Fon too often into my face, although I knew that word technically didn't mean anything. The characters are awesome - except Tear, who I think is a Canon Sue. She has the super special Yulia Yue as an ancestor, is the sister of the antagonist, giving her an emotional connection to him next to Luke - Guy, too, but not very much... and she is the only one who can use the damn Hymns that are essential to finish the game.Anyhow, I love the characters. Jade is a sarcastic jerk and being voiced by Takehito Koyasu just makes it more awesome. Anise is freaking ADORABLE! Guy is cool, Luke starts as a jerk, which I love, and you can really see how he changed over the course of the game. Oh and that scene with Asch towards the end always makes me cry.

But ever since Vesperia, I just kind of lost interest in Tales Of... Innocence and Hearts and all that, I never paid much attention to them. The R versions of those, I have even less interest of. Graces I only like because I have Cheria in Radiant Mythology 3 and she has a kick ass Hi Ougi.

I feel like Vesperia's battle system is absolutely BROKEN and makes the Overlimit way too freaking cheap. And I admit, I haven't played the game yet, but the story seems so silly - it's basically just an environmental message. And why does everybody seem to like Yuri?He's nothing special! He's basically a badass that talks rough and that's it. Luke did that before him and it had a higher impact.The only cool thing I think that Vesperia did is Judith - and not because of her big boobs but because her fighting style looks freaking AWESOME!

Also played Destiny on the PSX for a while, but quickly gave up... and why does everybody love Leon? Again, he's nothing special. He's the anti-hero with a silly sympathetic backstory and bam. That's it. Granted, having Midorikawa Hikaru voice him is freaking sexy, but that's not enough to make a character.

Spoiler: Tales of Destiny - Obvious Spoiler

By the way before I even KNEW Tales of Destiny, I knew Rutee and Leon were siblings. I saw ONE MANGA PAGE where both of them were on it and I was all, "....twins?"

I only played Symphonia and Graces. Since I started with Dawn of the new world, I didn't understand what was SOOOOO wrong with this game. I mean it wasn't the best RPG but it wasn't the worst. Then, I played the original one, and I can understand their hate. The first was cliché to death, but since it was well handled it pass. After all I can deal with cliché easily.

I wanted to try my hand on Abyss but another game needed my money more. Vesperia seem chill enough but I don't know how to read japanese.

I invested in Graces f when I bought a PS3. It felt like I was playing a Symphonia 2.0. It felt like it was the same story going on about why friend are important and gotta save them all, etc. Plus the character where a bunch of cliché. Enjoyable, but not that memorable.

I only played Symphonia and Graces. Since I started with Dawn of the new world, I didn't understand what was SOOOOO wrong with this game. I mean it wasn't the best RPG but it wasn't the worst. Then, I played the original one, and I can understand their hate. The first was cliché to death, but since it was well handled it pass. After all I can deal with cliché easily.

I wanted to try my hand on Abyss but another game needed my money more. Vesperia seem chill enough but I don't know how to read japanese.

I invested in Graces f when I bought a PS3. It felt like I was playing a Symphonia 2.0. It felt like it was the same story going on about why friend are important and gotta save them all, etc. Plus the character where a bunch of cliché. Enjoyable, but not that memorable.

Well... for American players it isn't all that different, since it is basically the localized PS2 version, only on a handheld meaning that you cannot do the World Map Glitch - which lets you keep someone in your party for longer than allowed or gain certain equipment earlier than you usually would - and no Multiplayer. Also some sidequest changes and such...

But since you never played Abyss before, I would definitely say the 3DS version is worth buying. It'll be new for you and I do not think the Tales Of series is a game series that can be played very well in multiplayer anyway... they are RPGs and any player other than the first one will just sit around, watching the game until a battle comes and they get to fight for a bit...

As for Knight of Ratatosk... yeah... I noticed that the people who only played Ratatosk like it a lot more than people who have played Symphonia first. There are people who like both, but I belong to the group of dislikers of Ratatosk. Symphonia never needed a sequel, it finished its story and any sequel should have focused on the journey of collecting Exspheres as Lloyd was going to, rather than this new kid we don't care about, this girl that is basically interchangable with any other hyperactive lovey-dovey girl and a cheap sarcastic version of Jade, just in a dog-ish form.

I wouldn't find it so bad if the game didn't feel like a rip off of a Tales game... it's missing so much that makes a Tales Of game a Tales Of game. And since they don't seem to be changing much of it in terms of the Unisonant Pack coming out, I doubt I would like it much more...

As for Vesperia, well if you have a 360, you can buy that. I know that, if I ever play Vesperia, it has to be the Japanese version. Ignoring Troy Baker voicing Yuri, I heard Judith's English voice and a cringed. What the fuck, why did you give her a high, girly voice? Goddammit, I know Hisakawa Aya voiced Sailor Mercury, but she gave Judith a husky, sultry voice that fit her flirtatious behavior and attitude. You can't have Judith say flirty things in a high voice, it's sounds like a little girl trying to sound like an adult woman and failing miserably.

Speaking of Vesperia's PS3 version... really, the Japanese voices would be the only reason why I would get it. If the 360 wasn't region-locked, I'd buy the 360 version. I don't care about that added in content of costumes, Patty and Flen.

Speaking of added in content, am I the only one who feels like Namco is trying too hard to make the newer Tales Of games appealing by shoving one Cameo costume after another into it? It started with Vesperia's PS3 version. Abyss costumes, Destiny costumes, Phantasia costumes, all over the place. And at least give them costumes that make sense - what makes them think Refill would look good in Pascal's outfit? Granted, I know nothing about Pascal, but her outfit looks crap on Refill. Give Refill Mint's outfit if you have to. It makes sense, they're both healers.

I'm personally excited for what they're going to announce, as long as it isn't something like "Tales of Xilia: Solo Remix".

Anyone else excited?

I saw that earlier, and I'm hoping it's going to be a main mothership title.And if I remember correctly, Baba said that Tales would stay on the PS3 and they wouldn't transition to next gen for a bit.I'm with you on the fact that I hope it isn't some Social/mobile game, and I'm pretty sure it's not going to be.

Okay, on a topic in regards to how the party reacts to Luke's actions in Akzeruth, we somehow got to the talk about Anise much later in the game. I guess I'll put it in spoilers, in case anybody hasn't played the game and doesn't know what happens.

Spoiler: Late Game Spoilers

We ended up talking about Anise's betrayal and how things went down, why she did those things, etc, etc. Like, she never really thought Ion's life was in danger, cause she didn't know Mohs wanted him to read the Planet Score, which could kill him.

But anyway, people keep saying that Anise feels bad for having killed "the person she loved" and I just have to ask. Where is it ever officially mentioned in the game that Anise loves Ion? Yeah, she cares about him and protects him - but guess what? That's her fucking job!Then the discussion came up that she defended Ion and got mad when he got critizied, in a skit. Exactly how that is supposed to, in any way, mean love is beyond me. And I am not taking into account any stupid idea of "DEFENDING = LOVE" or any shit like that.

And here's the kicker: somebody said it involved sex and "how can you (as in, I) not see that"? What the.... what the FUCK does getting mad over somebody being criticized have to do with SEX!? How does that even equate to Love, in any fashion?

Look, I know love and sex can mix and a lot of people confuse sex for love. But those two are actually entirely different things! They can mix together and fulfill a physical and also emotional desire, but sex is stricly a physical thing and love emotional. How can anybody see sex in Abyss, when it comes to Anise defending Ion from being critizied?

I know I have a pretty dirty mind and the simplest sentence can seem like an innuendo to me.But only when I can see that the potential for an innuendo is there.Like Ace Attorney is chock-full of it! I mean, come on: Hard Evidence.

So, how long is it until Tales of the Abyss "gets better?" I'm ten hours into it (just saved Ion, woo), and so far, the gameplay has been fairly easy, the plot is pretty standard stuff, and I get the feeling that the game wants me to find Anise "endearing."

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

So, how long is it until Tales of the Abyss "gets better?" I'm ten hours into it (just saved Ion, woo), and so far, the gameplay has been fairly easy, the plot is pretty standard stuff, and I get the feeling that the game wants me to find Anise "endearing."

You're pretty much close to the end of the first Arc. You'll get to Deo Pass (which is where I find Luke to overstep the line of "Ok Jerk" to "Downright Unpleasant" the only time in the entire game, but I blame shit writing for that) and then things start happening when you get to Akzeruth.So about... eh, another hour before you get to the first plot twists. Then things start to get a bit better.

Unless you like Jerk Luke. (I know I do but I also like him in the other parts in the game)

Ten more hours into Tales of the Abyss and I'm finally starting to enjoy it. The gameplay has gone from "not a challenge" to "at least it resembles a challenge," the character interactions are engaging (especially now that Luke finally grew a sense of responsibility), and I'm really liking the direction the world is taking.But about the gameplay: while I like the fact that my allies have competent AI *cough*Persona3*cough*, sometimes it feels like I can just keep pressing X and occasionally O to win. The only time I felt like I needed to do something was when fighting Legretta. Also,

Spoiler:

I don't care if I had to spend one hour mostly consisting of skipping through that same cutscene over and over to get to this, it was completely worth it.

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

I need to write this down before I continue any further into the game.

Spoiler: Tales of the Abyss

-How old was the original Ion when he became Fon Master? Because I'm having a hard time believing that a kid who hasn't reached puberty yet is at the top of the Order of Lorelei and everyone accepts that.-"Pitying her means mocking the ideals she fought for." Said by Largo after Arietta's death. If that was referring to Arietta following Van's ideals for a replica Isle of Feres, that would be fine. However, Arietta died from challenging Anise to a duel over "letting Ion die." Why didn't Anise, or anyone in the party, inform Arietta that the Ion she knew had died years ago? I'm not saying Arietta would instantly believe that and call off the duel, but the way things went, the party let Arietta die believing in a false cause and didn't even acknowledge it.

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

I need to write this down before I continue any further into the game.

Spoiler: Tales of the Abyss

-How old was the original Ion when he became Fon Master? Because I'm having a hard time believing that a kid who hasn't reached puberty yet is at the top of the Order of Lorelei and everyone accepts that.-"Pitying her means mocking the ideals she fought for." Said by Largo after Arietta's death. If that was referring to Arietta following Van's ideals for a replica Isle of Feres, that would be fine. However, Arietta died from challenging Anise to a duel over "letting Ion die." Why didn't Anise, or anyone in the party, inform Arietta that the Ion she knew had died years ago? I'm not saying Arietta would instantly believe that and call off the duel, but the way things went, the party let Arietta die believing in a false cause and didn't even acknowledge it.

Spoiler: Answers

I believe their reason was that telling her that her beloved Ion had already been dead for a good 2 years was too cruel... ...yeah it's a dumb reason and could potentially have altered things. It just goes to show that, despite a good time passing between Akzeruth and the battle with Arietta, the party has learned NOTHING about the huge consequences of keeping things from other people.

As for Ion, eh, maybe he became Fon Master (Japanese his title was Priest/Doushi) because he was capable of reading the planet score, which is a requirement to become leader of Lorelei? I honestly do not recall what the reason was. Then again, I seem to recall that Peony technically was king around the age of 12, too? I know he spent his childhood in Kethelbrook, but childhood can mean various stages.

Leaving some final thoughts on Tales of the Abyss after 45 hours, 50 minutes, and 40 seconds.

Spoiler:

-Did the game really try to make me sympathize with Mohs? Mohs? The guy who started a war and caused Ion's death because he blindly devoted himself to the Score? Somehow, the guys wanting to kill all of humanity ended up more sympathetic than him.-All right, here we go. Luke vs Asch. Original vs replica. The battle to determine the superior... ends in just enough time for the music to complete one loop. Probably wasn't my best idea to spend an hour trying to win the first fight against Asch. -How can the Outer Lands exist if its circumference is the same as that of the Qliphoth? Last time I checked, you can't have a sphere inside a sphere the exact same size as that sphere with enough room in between for the Tower of Rem to not reach the outer sphere.-I honestly didn't realize that Luke and Tear were supposed to be in love until the night before the final battle. Well, maybe I did, and I just didn't want to believe it.-So the identity of the person at the end... was supposed to be ambiguous? 1. If it was Asch, it would defeat the whole meaning of the duel. 2. We saw Asch die. He is brain-dead. His memories are gone. So even if Luke and Asch fused, the person at the end would most likely have Luke's memories. And this is coming from someone who ships AschxNatalia.-All that said, I really enjoyed playing through this game. The combat was damn satisfying, the characters decent enough, and the game handled the theme of fate in a way that actually made it interesting.-Oh wow, I actually listed Tear as a fictional crush. See, this is why they're called crushes. It crushes you when you realize they're probably not worth all the hype.

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

Leaving some final thoughts on Tales of the Abyss after 45 hours, 50 minutes, and 40 seconds.

Spoiler:

-Did the game really try to make me sympathize with Mohs? Mohs? The guy who started a war and caused Ion's death because he blindly devoted himself to the Score? Somehow, the guys wanting to kill all of humanity ended up more sympathetic than him.-All right, here we go. Luke vs Asch. Original vs replica. The battle to determine the superior... ends in just enough time for the music to complete one loop. Probably wasn't my best idea to spend an hour trying to win the first fight against Asch. -How can the Outer Lands exist if its circumference is the same as that of the Qliphoth? Last time I checked, you can't have a sphere inside a sphere the exact same size as that sphere with enough room in between for the Tower of Rem to not reach the outer sphere.-I honestly didn't realize that Luke and Tear were supposed to be in love until the night before the final battle. Well, maybe I did, and I just didn't want to believe it.-So the identity of the person at the end... was supposed to be ambiguous? 1. If it was Asch, it would defeat the whole meaning of the duel. 2. We saw Asch die. He is brain-dead. His memories are gone. So even if Luke and Asch fused, the person at the end would most likely have Luke's memories. And this is coming from someone who ships AschxNatalia.-All that said, I really enjoyed playing through this game. The combat was damn satisfying, the characters decent enough, and the game handled the theme of fate in a way that actually made it interesting.-Oh wow, I actually listed Tear as a fictional crush. See, this is why they're called crushes. It crushes you when you realize they're probably not worth all the hype.

Spoiler: Answers

* Yes they did and yes it was incredibly dumb.

* The music of the duel is pretty epic, just one more rendition of the opening Karma. Which is SO much better with its lyrics cause they actually MEAN something. Btw what did you think of Asch's death scene? I always cry at it, and I have a love-hate relationship with "Promise" the violin karma rendition when it happens.

* Eh... Auldrant is a... strange... place. Their year is close to 600 Days, too...

* Yeah, it's kind of DIFFICULT to actually believe there to be a believeable romance... it feels so shoe-horned in or played like crushes kids in kindergarten have on each other. Never get past the awkward stage, even after hours of shoving scene after scene of those two into my face. (Ok I already don't like Tear, but that has nothing to do with my thinking that Luke and Tear were not a good choice for the "obligatory couple" in the game... heck, I think ANISE had more, legitimate feelings for Luke! Even if it started off as "He's rich, I want his moneym!"

* Yes but if you recall the scene, we do see Asch's hand twitch. Luke also disappears - so I guess, the least we could say was that Mr Ending's body is, at least originally, Asch's(1). And I think it's a nice way to end a game that had the question what the meaning of one's birth was. I personally go by the idea that they're a fusion of both. And for comedy sakes, split personality. (I totally ship AschxNatalia!)

(1) There are ideas that Mr Ending is an incarnation of Lorelei, that he's a replica that Jade made, he's Luke, he's Asch, they're fused, it's someone entirely different who just happens to talk about a promise... which btw, I think the talk about the promise COULD refer to the one Asch gave to Luke (and indirectly to Natalia) about "surviving". People say it's obviously Luke cause he talks to Tear, which is dumb... he talks to Tear cause she's the one TALKING to HIM.People also say it HAS to be Asch due to the Contamination Sidequest - a sidequest where the cheagle Star, that you saved earlier, talks about how it died, but it came back to life and its replica was gone, so the idea is that if the original dies first, it gets resurrected by the death of the replica.While this is apparently the idea, problem is that Asch did NOT die from the Big Bang Effect. He died through bloodloss from the stab wounds... So already the entire Contamination Sidequest seems like a waste of time since it has nothing to do with the situation. Or doesn't apply to it.

* The game is good. I originally played the game cause I heard people talk much about it and I was curious why they liked it so much. And I was not disappointed, the game was good. And the characters were good, too. Story had some pacing issues at times, particularly towards the 3rd Arc when you just go to a place for a scene. Well the arc was short, so...

I've been playing a fan translation of Tales of Innocence lately, and I feel like giving some thoughts.The combat is definitely the strongest aspect of the game; it just feels so damn satisfying to rack up a 106-hit combo. The difficulty is also very welcome. The stage design... not so much. Most of the stages consist of narrow hallways that all look the same. The lack of a dungeon minimap really doesn't help when the scenery in the first hallway looks exactly like the fifth hallway. And whose idea was it to place the save points at least a full two-minute walk away from the bosses?The characters... oh boy. Depending on the direction the game takes with Luca, I might like his character. The rest of the party is just okay, except for Iria and Spada. I feel so conflicted on their characters.

Spoiler:

As reckless as she is, Iria still has a strong sense of responsibility and even helps Luca's character grow. Spada has the least amount of angst, despite having a lot to angst about, and has a Ho Yay-tastic relationship with acts as a sort-of older brother figure to Luca. Except when they're being needlessly cruel to him. There's a scene where Luca stands up to Chitose, claiming that no matter what Iria did in her past life, he'll still defend the girl who helped him out of his wangst, which I felt was his legitimate awesome moment. A few skits later, Iria and Spada get bored and decide to resort to "their favorite passtime":Granted, the game doesn't show what action "pick on Luca" refers to, but the skit ends with Luca running off crying while saying "You guys are so mean!" Did I get this skit in the wrong order or something? Or was the game making them look like pretentious jerks completely intentional?

Oh yeah, and Coda is completely pointless. Even Mieu had more character than that thing.Also, maybe it's just the fan translation, but I think I've seen the phrases "it would seem" and "let it go" several times over. The game is still fun, but there are several odd design choices.

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

Cannot say much about Innocence itself, my only experience with Innocence and its characters is their appearance in Radiant Mythology games. And, well, there the characters tend to be either focused on their biggest parts (Lloyd being kind of an idiot, Luke either being a pretentious asshole if he has long hair or a good-natured guy who wants to change for the better if he has short hair) or their early personalities (like Kratos just being a mysterious mentor, Zelos being a cheerful flirter) and I think the Innocence one were the latter form.

Ilia is shown to be teasing towards Luca, Luca himself as very weak and introverted and Spada... I think he's more shown as Luca's friend, but not much of a teaser... then again, Spada was kind of a not-really-noticeable guy...

37 hours, 34 minutes and 52 seconds were needed for me to complete Tales of Innocence. My opinions haven't really changed; it's a fun game, but it has its flaws.-Luca's character did take the direction I was hoping it would take. So yeah, he's all right.-Iria and Spada have sort of redeemed themselves by the end. Sort of.-The final dungeon really need work. Out of all the hallways dungeons in the game, this was the worst. It's a single long narrow path where you can only see at most ten feet in front of you. On top of that, the difficulty suddenly rose as enemies have higher defense and can kill you with a single combo. Also, that single long narrow path? It repeats. Three times. At least it had the decency to place the save points right next to the bosses.-I'm still deciding if being able to kill the final boss with a 999-hit combo was good or bad game design.-I don't know much about the quality of the villains in the Tales Series, but I doubt they could be as one dimensional as the villains in this game. To count:

Spoiler:

-Mathias wants to destroy the world because... "I do not need a reason!" I shit you not, reader, that is the exact line of text she used to justify her actions.-Oswald wants to be a god.-Hasta is your typical murderous sociopath except with the annoying factor turned up to eleven. In fact, I think I know why this game was never localized; no English voice, not even the guy who voiced Dist, could never hope to achieve the level of annoying that Mitsuaki Madono pulled off. His "gambit" which involved Luca holding the Idiot Ball didn't really help.-Chitose loved Asura in her past life, so she tries to get Luca's affection... but then it turns out Asura's soul was split in two and Mathias bears the other half, so her feelings shift onto Mathias without hesitation... and then she kills herself after Mathias dies.-Chien is the obligatory guy who blindly followed the villain thinking she had good intentions, then leaves once she reveals her true intentions.-Albert was somehow convinced not to go ahead with his plans with a single speech.

Yeah, this game wasn't very good with its villains.

Spoiler: Also worth noting

The romance was never really resolved in the end. It's just left hanging. Luca tries to confess his feelings to Iria, but Iria can't hear him because the Manifest likes to be noisy when its restoring the world. The party goes back to Regnum, and they just say goodbye. Apparently, that scene could have been different depending on the party member Luca has the highest friendship value with, but Iria has the most opportunities to boost friendship with, so the player is more likely to get that scene regardless.

Bottom line: it was an okay game. Not as good as Abyss, but still decent enough.

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

Majority of villains in Tales Of games... tend to resort to the "Sympathetic/Feel Sorry For Me" type. And while I HATE sympathetic villains if they are done sympathetically by simply giving them a sobby backstory, I think there are instances where it's done well.

Yggdrasill in Symphonia. Sympathetic reason, yeah the game is pretty heavy on the racism thing, but Yggdrasill is the type of villain where I can see WHY he comes up with the stupid idea to do things the way he does. So he was done okay as a sympathetic villain.

Dhaos gets a sympathetic reason for his actions... during the cutscenes of the ending. You never find out his sympathetic reason until you have killed him, finishing the game. So you are perfectly allowed to hate him as much as you want throughout the entire game and only get a slight pang of "Oh my god... I'm a monster..." during the ending.Then again, I can also say that Dhaos' way of doing things CAUSED things to happen, too."They mustn't create a Mana Cannon! It will drain the life of the World Tree and kill it! I must stop them... I will ATTACK THE PLACE THAT IS BUILDING A MANA CANNON so that it will NOT build a Mana Cannon - OmG they hurried up and built the mana cannon and are using it! YOU FOOLS!"

The rest of the villains... are hit and miss. Although I think the WORST one I have encountered to date was Lambda from Graces.

Spoiler: Tales of Graces: Lambda

He's an energy entity from Fodra. And he has possessed Richard for years, but only broke out recently. He kills things left, right and center. Has no real plan on doing anything, except destroy things... which isn't so bad, I don't mind a villain who does evil things cause Evil or for fun.

It's later. And by later I mean the FINAL DUNGEON that they fuck it up. As you proceed through the final dungeon, you walk into these glass barrier walls and you are forced to see his backstory. And it's a dumb feel-sorry-for-him backstory in that he was used for experiments and not treated like a real boy... YOU AREN'T A REAL BOY! You are ENERGY! Sentient energy! It's done really, REALLY poorly (and the fact that Asbel thinks his life was SO SIMILAR to Lambda's is just dumb. The story is told at the very end, when we really do NOT care anymore. What do we even care about Lambda, we've technically been fighting Richard the entire time. And Richard is our TOMODACHI-I mean our FRIEND! We care about him, not whatever the fuck possessed him when he almost died 7 years ago. Urgh.

Yes, Asbel. Growing up in a big, rich house with a loving mother and a father you do not like much, but you get the opportunity to flip him off and run away to fulfill your childhood dream of becoming a knight and protecting people, basically taking your life into your own hands at the age of ELEVEN was SO TOTALLY the same as being painfully experimented on for years without break, like Lambda was!

Worst part is, they "defeat" Lambda by talking him to sleep... Fucking hell, Graces was SO... ...missstep.

Is it me, or is the combat in the first Radiant Mythology slower compared to the other games? I greatly enjoyed the combat in both Abyss and Innocence, but here, it just feels like a drag. That, and I feel like this game is trying too hard to get me to like Kanonno without actually showing me what she's capable of.

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

Is it me, or is the combat in the first Radiant Mythology slower compared to the other games? I greatly enjoyed the combat in both Abyss and Innocence, but here, it just feels like a drag. That, and I feel like this game is trying too hard to get me to like Kanonno without actually showing me what she's capable of.

Much as I like the Radiant Mythology games, I will say that RM1 is... not just heavily outdated compared to the 2nd and 3rd Game, but that it is also... nothing against the game, but it feels like it was done half-heartedly. I think RM1 was like a little experiment of theirs - how popular would a game be where you customize your own character who plays a vital role, with a handful of new characters, but you have various Tales Of characters that you can recruit and interact with in the game?

Turns out, it was pretty popular! Got a 2nd and 3rd Game! But those were unfortunately not released in the Western market... which is really sad because Radiant Mythology 2 totally improves a lot of things in RM 1! Bigger cast (including Yuri and Estelle, though Yuri is lacking a ton of skills), funnier skits, though I will say the villain isn't much better... then again, none of the villains in RM games are very good...

Yes for RM1, the battle system is pretty slow. It's basically a take on the Abyss battle system, minus FoF changes and party members asking if they can use an item to heal themselves, with lots of Abyss enemies.

And yes, the game shoves Kannono in your face. She is the canon (ha!) love interest for the player character. Which overall isn't terrible, it's just that in RM1, the text between her interaction with a male descender is not changed with her interaction with a female descender - so you play the game as a girl and Kannono is totally crushing on you and in love with you... nothing against that, really, it just feels so odd. (RM2 and RM3 make her more sisterly when interacting with the descender, though there the emphasis is a BIT less on her)

Cool, glad to see there are Tales fans here as well! I've played every single one aside from Legendia, Destiny2, and Rebirth.

I've even played a couple Japanese only spin off titles such as the Narikiri dungeon games, Tales of Versus (AMAZING GAME) and Tales of Twin Brave. I started with Symphonia on GC like most tales fans, and My favourite ones are Vesperia, Symphonia and Graces f ~ <3

Ahh, I take it you weren't too fond of Graces? A lot of Tales fans aren't. I like it, for SO many reasons though:

- The characters. Malik, (my favourite), Richard, and Sophie were just really beautiful characters in my opinion. I loved their stories, and heart warming relationship struggles. But I REALLY enjoyed how each character had a defined relationship with every other character, unlike in symphonia, (ex how Kratos never once spoke a word directly to Sheena, Regal Presea ect)

- The Story. In my eyes, it has such a beautiful, deep narrative solely about friendship and human relationships. Usually games and have that cheesey "With friends, I can do anything," and "friend ship is power" but friendship isnt the main story plot in those games, where as it is in Graces. Because Graces purely focuses on what it means to be a friend, it delved deeper into the obstacles and richness in human relationships.

- The humour. DEFINTELY had the funniest skits in any tales game ever! And the humour went deeper to even make fun of itself, and it's cheeseyness! Such as Asbel's generic protagonist need to protect, and Cheria's typical, "oh I obviously secretly like the main boy character but he's oblivious. "

-and finally the battle system. It took getting used to, and i too was critical and judgemental of it when i first played it, but its definitely the best battle systems in the series in my opinion. I like because the game is ACTUALLY HARD ( I played on evil mode), and the battle system even works into the overall theme of friendship and relationships. If you and your friends time your attacks with precision, you will be unstoppable, but when one teammate dies, you find your whole team dying off quickly.

Basically, it's all the little things make it wonderful in my eyes ^u^

CatMuto wrote:

As for Zestiria... it never made much impact on me when it was initially revealed so I haven't stayed up to date with its news.

Hoo, Yeah I sadly feel the same. Not to be judgey but it looks kinda generic to me.

Not really. It's not really a bad game, I just feel it did missteps that just were missteps to me.

Spoiler: Graces Character

I like Richard, but mostly cause he's kinda foppish and flamboyant. His actions during the game I cannot say are his own, given that - outside of the childhood arc - we never saw Richard himself, we just constantly saw Richard possessed by Lambda. Sure, Lambda doesn't fully "break out" until the end of Wallbridge (FUCK THAT PLACE BY THE WAY!) and takes over, but the Richard beforehand was still possessed by Lambda and his personality was no-doubt formed by that, so we cannot say it is 100% Richard the entire time. The only time we can do that is in the childhood arc.

Sophie, I didn't mind her actually... I just fail to see the big issue in her "getting emotions" arc. She never struck me as perfectly lacking in emotions, she always seemed like she did have emotions and displayed them throughout the game, so when a scene happened where everyone was putting emphasis on it that Sophie was having emotions... I just wondered what the big deal was, since she didn't seem to act any differently.

Asbel is... I dunno, he kinda bugs me. He's not very compelling initially since his big personality part is "I protect everyone!" and he likes to call people he's known the name of for five minutes his friend for life. Though I think what bugs me the most is his big denial about Richard and how he "hasn't changed" over seven years.Um, Asbel, he did. Those seven years? You can't say anything about that time because you spent those years having NO contact with him! I also really, really hate Asbel for thinking his "poor life" (you know, getting to tell your father off and run away from home to successfully fulfill your childhood dream of becoming a knight) was in ANY WAY comparable to Lambda's life (an alient energy force that was put into an adroid's body and continuously torture-experimented on).

Pascal is positive and kind of entertaining, but I don't see why people love her SO much. I mean, she's fun. But not THAT great. Also, can we agree that Cheria is, like, the worst character? Marik himself didn't leave much of an impact on me... he's the "generic cool older guy".

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In my eyes, it has such a beautiful, deep narrative solely about friendship and human relationships.

Well, if you say so... I feel like they went at it rather childishly. You know, constantly shouting that they are FRIENDS and nothing with harm their FRIENDSHIP... And even then, if their message of what friendship is, is "Always trust your friend, even when they do terrible things" I can say I can do without that just fine. If I think a friend of mine did something really terrible, I will call them out on it. Which Graces didn't seem to do, as pointed out in the character spoiler, it's more like some kept being in denial about it.

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The humour. DEFINTELY had the funniest skits in any tales game ever!

Oh, I definitely agree on the skits - especially the one in that one city with the bell tower (Graselyde? Gryasled? I forget already, I only played it once.) where Pascal talks about Asbel and Richard constantly being all "mwah-mwah" and "hanky panky" toward each other. That made me laugh!The skit of The Mask Of Barona... did not... and neither did most of the other skits, actually. And Cheria's "I love Asbel but he doesn't knoooooow!" was... well, I think Cheria is the worst character, so... (She has a pretty cool fighting style, though)

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and finally the battle system

I thought it was okay. Not a great system, but not a bad one, either. I just didn't like how, in order to get more EXP, I had to play on higher difficulties, when I would have much more preferred to just get good EXP but still play on lower difficulties so I can focus on the story and what's going on, instead of dreading every boss battle because they would be difficult. (That stupid boar thing in front of that one place, in the snowy place, made me rage quit for a while - Strangely enough, the three optional dragons were much easier for me, even underleveled)

Acctuaallyyyyy, Pascal was my least favourite character... I didn't think she was all that funny, and she seemed really over the top, and her quirkiness was so predictable and it got old fast. I didn't hate Cheria's presence, and she was just the typical cute girly, caring girl type character.

CatMuto wrote:

You know, constantly shouting that they are FRIENDS and nothing with harm their FRIENDSHIP... And even then, if their message of what friendship is, is "Always trust your friend, even when they do terrible things" I can say I can do without that just fine. If I think a friend of mine did something really terrible, I will call them out on it. Which Graces didn't seem to do, as pointed out in the character spoiler, it's more like some kept being in denial about it.

Spoiler: The broken friendship

Only at the beginning, when they were children, is where they all cheesey about friendship, and that whole arc was supposed to show the irony of how they all became "best friends" instantly and blindly vowed to trust each other for life, only for it to get dark fast, and it showed how their "unbreakable childhood friendship" cracked and fell apart so fast. (Cheria, Hubert hating Asbel, Sophie dying, and Richard and the others apart for years.) And they didn't think it was okay with what Richard was doing.They just felt conflicted about killing him because of his actions because he was their dear friend. And who wouldn't, but they were all prepared to kill him. They just wanted to find another way. I really like how flawed Asbel was as a character. It just shows how blown out of proportion that friendship ideology is, and how flawed it is. He's so dumb, and I like that he was. If that makes sense

Oh I never played the game on normal mode, so I didn't really even know how hard the bosses would have been on that mode. I personally love losing in Tales games, because it makes it really fun for me to try again and win. But trust me, the extra EXP on Evil mode and all, doesn't matter cuz the bosses will whoop you regardless When a Tales is SOOOO easy, I get kinda upset. It's a large reason why I have a distaste for Abyss.

Acctuaallyyyyy, Pascal was my least favourite character... I didn't think she was all that funny, and she seemed really over the top, and her quirkiness was so predictable and it got old fast. I didn't hate Cheria's presence, and she was just the typical cute girly, caring girl type character.

I find Pascal okay. She's definitely a bit TOO quirky and positive at times, which can be pretty jarring considering that some of the scenes are definitely supposed to be serious and she kind of ruins it. I think the only reason I "hate" Pascal is because of the same reason I hate the entire F Arc of the game.Absolutely, constantly shoving in my face how Pascal and Hubert are totally into each other. (Or, in Pascal's brainscattered way, as into someone as she can be while busy inventing and all) It's, of course, not as bad as the F Arc is with Asbel and Cheria, but... still pretty annoying.

And my problem with Cheria is... okay, she was first shown as a sickly kid that had an obvious crush on Asbel. Okay, whatever, if you have to. When she first reappears after the 7 year time skip, she seems to have gotten healthy and DEFINITELY seems to have gotten over her crush on Asbel. She even yells at him for his irresponsible, dumb way of running off and not contacting anyone for years! I loved that!But...!Unfortunately... that was the highlight of her entire character. After she yells at Asbel, she quickly goes into the background and then the game pretty much forgets about her. She's just there, she's kind of the nice girl, but she is absolutely bland and lacking anything in terms of personality. Then comes the F Arc and suddenly it's slamming my face into the game saying "Asbel and Cheria are totally in love! THEY ARE IN LOVE!! DO YOU GET IT?! DO YOU GET IT!?" which... I HATE it when a game shoves a specific pairing into my face, especially if it's one I don't really believe (like Squall and Rinoa from FF VIII or Luke and Tear from Tales of the Abyss), but the F Arc seems like it was created JUST so that one thing is not made "Well that came outta nowhere!" in the final FMV.

Spoiler: Graces Spoilers

Case in point the kid that is OBVIOUSLY related to Cheria and Asbel - I have NO idea why anyone would think that the child could be Sophie's. For one, she's a robot so she can't give birth, for another... the kid was Mini!Asbel + Cheria's hair and eye color. Anyone who thought that the kid was actually Sophie's with Asbel was, quite frankly, a moron.

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When a Tales is SOOOO easy, I get kinda upset. It's a large reason why I have a distaste for Abyss.

...well, Abyss was pretty difficult in the beginning, but I wouldn't say it was absolutely easy after. Did you play on Unknown? (Better yet, play the Japanese PS2's Unknown version, where the multiplier for parameters was x4 and not x3.5, as it was lowered for the localized release)

C-A

PS: I can honestly say, though, out of the Tales Of games I have played, Graces has the WORST dungeon designs...

After completing Radiant Mythology, I think my main problem with this game is that it lacks polish. There are some good ideas here, but some odd design choices.First, the "acceptance" system. You pick up the game, you want to fight with your favorite Tales Series characters (not that it really applies to me, considering I've only played two games, of which characters from only one of those are present), only to find that they rejected your invitation. Instead, you need to keep doing meaningless quest after meaningless quest until they accept you. And even when they have accepted you, sometimes they still refuse. Ever since Senel joined the guild, I have tried countless times to get him to join the party. He never accepted, even after he "thought of the player character as a good friend." Sure, you can't just expect people to accept you immediately, but this is a non-sexual fanservice crossover action JRPG. I think the player already has a bit of suspension of disbelief.It doesn't really help that until then, you're stuck with other randomly named blank slates for party members. Raise your hand if you really liked working alongside Mustafa. No? Didn't think so. If they wanted to use this system, they could have at least given us someone with an identity to work with early on. You know, someone who the game keeps shoving in your face, claiming she's a productive member of Ad Libitum, obviously wanting you to bond with her so when the obvious bad thing happens, you actually care?Which brings me to the next point: Kanonno the obligatory crossover OC. I didn't hate her, but at the same time, there wasn't much about her to like. Aside from taking care of the invisible orphans, I can't remember a single thing she actually did over the course of the game before the obvious reveal. Making her a party member wouldn't exactly "fix" her, but it would at least allow the player to bond with her at least a little.Lastly, the actual meat of the game. It took twenty-seven hours and fifteen minutes for me to reach the end, and I'm pretty sure I spent at least half of that time grinding. And while I know I missed out on a ton of call backs, for the most part, I didn't find the skits very amusing. Though I will admit that Kratos pointing out that Mormo shouldn't exist, Tear aggressively petting Mormo, Luke wanting to punt Mormo, and the dialogue option "Smack Mormo." did give me a few laughs.Also, I think the final boss was designed to give me Ansem flashbacks, but I don't hold that against the game.

Anyways, I started playing Radiant Mythology 3 with just the names and menus translated. Even though I have no idea what anyone is saying, I already find this much better than the first. The combat feels faster, Jade Curtiss is in this game, this game's Kanonno isn't being shoved in my face as much and actually does something (I think), party members aren't refusing for no justifiable reason, the dungeons are much more varied in design, and the number of recruitable characters is extensive.And I'm totally making good use of that extensive cast.

"It's never too late to learn that growing old doesn't have to mean growing up. Stay curious, stay weird, stay kind, and don't let anyone ever tell you you aren't smart or brave or worthy enough." -Stanford Pines, Gravity Falls

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